On the morning of October 27, Dr. Eliane Karp de Toledo, First Lady of the Republic of Peru, accompanied by Ambassador of the Republic of Peru in China, visited SIPO and was warmly welcomed by Commissioner Wang Jingchuan.

As an active politician, Dr. Eliane Karp was interested in the protection of traditional knowledge, especially the traditional medicine, and hoped to draw experience from China. Commissioner Wang expressed his appreciation for the First Lady's concern on intellectual property protection and hoped to further promote the bilateral cooperation between the two countries in the IP field through her visit. The First Lady thanked the Commissioner for his hospitality and indicated that Peru, as a developing country, started to pay attention to IP protection only in recent years, especially to the protection of indigenous knowledge. Now, Peru has become the first Latin American country making legislation on the protection of indigenous knowledge. However, in the protection of traditional medicine, Peru still lacks experience and would like to carry out cooperation with China.

Commissioner Wang briefly introduced the history and current status of Chinese IP system. He indicated that China, like Peru, had a short history in developing IP system, but developed very fast, and would like to share its experience with other developing countries. He pointed out that the reform on the modern international IP system should not only be conducive to the technical progress and effective utilization of resources, but also conducive to the interests of all countries, especially developing countries. China supported any reasonable suggestions raised by other countries in the interests of effective protection of traditional knowledge. We believed that it was important for the economic growth and sustainable development. At present, traditional IP legislation, like trademark, patent, geographic indication and unfair competition laws, provides certain protection for traditional knowledge. However, due to its specialty, the current IP system couldn't provide enough protection for traditional knowledge. In this sense, we were in favor of making researches on making special or supplemental methods to provide adequate protection for it. China made some trials on legislation to protect traditional knowledge, however, those were far away from perfection. Peru's legislation on indigenous knowledge was meaningful for China and our both sides should further enhance cooperation in this field.

The meeting was very successful. Both sides agreed to establish a joint working group for further details.

2003-11-18

2003-11-18